


poetry fell in love with some guy

by betteroffbad



Category: Greek and Roman Mythology
Genre: F/M, M/M, gender swap, not that it matters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-21
Updated: 2019-02-21
Packaged: 2019-11-01 13:40:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17868299
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/betteroffbad/pseuds/betteroffbad
Summary: poetry never learns





	poetry fell in love with some guy

poetry fell in love with some guy  
not a beautiful guy  
not anyone in particular  
like you wouldn't even notice if you saw him at the WaWa  
buying a pickle in a bag or a giant cup of coffee  
naturally being human the guy eventually died  
of some dumb human cause like too many cheetos  
or a train falling on him or old age  
sometimes it's a girl but the story's the same  
poetry was inconsolable as usual  
everyone was like poetry  
what were you thinking  
this happens every time  
you're an eternal emergent property of verbal intelligence  
and that dude is just a dude  
he's not even good looking  
you've got to get over it  
it's like falling in love with a carpet beetle larva  
or a cicada skin or something

that gave poetry an idea  
everything always gave poetry ideas  
poetry decided to go into the ground  
and sing his dead man back alive  
he knew he could do it  
with the right combination  
of boldness and grammar poetry is capable of anything  
that's the difference between poetry and real life

poetry sang his way down into the cellar  
he sang down the rickety steps into the catacombs  
he sang into the black subbasement beneath the true earth  
where the dead drift around like dust and no one remembers music  
he played his guitar and the chords filled up the darkness  
the queen of the dead was a sucker for poetry  
she was eternally susceptable to chords and words that rhyme  
the dusty tears rolled down her gigantic naked cheekbones  
before the lyrics even started she was making ugly sobbing sounds  
she knew what was coming  
it had happened before

it had all happened a billion times before  
poetry never learns from experience  
the dead were all listening with what was left of their ears  
all the dead men and women poetry had loved and failed to save  
they rose on the sound of his voice like cartoon cats  
on the smell of cartoon meat pies left carelessly on tables  
they swirled like airborne dust illuminated by the chords of his guitar  
they had forgotten music until this moment  
every time no matter how many times it happened  
every time they thought this time it would work  
the sounds from poetry's mouth and poetry's strings were inevitable  
and so their rescue must also be inevitable  
that's what poetry does to you  
it makes you believe in things  
you have no reason to believe in  
in sounds instead of meaning  
in drumbeats instead of dust

you probably already know what happens next  
poetry made the queen of the dead cry  
poetry lay down on the packed solid dust of the subbasement of the dead  
and sang his lovers loose from their invisible chains  
by this time there were thousands of them  
some newly dead and almost whole  
some barely more than a cold gash in the air  
they rose and began the long trek up the stairs to the land of the living  
hoping and fearing he would look back at them  
knowing and not knowing he still loved them enough  
to lose them forever again and again

poetry never learns  
by now everyone is more or less resigned to it  
one day you too will meet poetry  
at a concert or the dog park or at some party  
you almost didn't go to and he will fall in love  
hopelessly and forever, the way only poetry  
can fall in love  
it makes no difference  
how beautiful or talented you aren't or how indifferent  
he loves you for being alive and for being real  
in the specific way that only you are  
and the things about yourself you hate the most  
he breathes to bright glowing and rejoices in  
poetry will always be like this  
it's no use trying to change him

one day of course you too will die  
and poetry will be inconsolable as usual  
it doesn't matter if you write 100 books  
and live to a contented old age  
and die peacefully surrounded by your loving family and friends  
or however it is you would most like to die  
it doesn't matter if you do everything you wanted to do in life  
and then say out loud to poetry in your most serious voice  
"I'm so glad I had a good long life  
I'm really looking forward to being dead"  
poetry will flat out refuse to bear it  
he will weep and make songs  
he will try to sing you back to him  
again and again and again and again

don't worry about it too much  
eventually it happens to everyone  
the nice thing about poetry never learning  
is that poetry never learns  
the one thing that always defeats poetry's love  
is his love  
he will carry his heartbreaking chords into the darkness  
he will sing his plea in rhyme to the sentimental queen of the dead  
you will rise with the rest borne on his selfish ageless sorrow toward the rotting staircase of the dead  
you will feel as if there is nothing in the world but that song  
you will follow him up those black black stairs with your eyes on the back of his head thinking  
look back you sucker  
look back motherfucker  
look back  
look back  
look back  



End file.
